Thursday, September 28, 2006

Today's article about Wisconsin's national championship coaches includes heavyweight coach Bebe Bryans as the head coach of the national champion Wisconsin lightweights. Nothing against Coach Bryans, but as we all know, Mary Shofner coached that crew to the championship. It would have been interesting to know if Bryans could even name the eight Wisco rowers. In fairness to the coach, however, Shofner is no longer at Wisconsin and I'm sure she would've had Coach Shofner represent the lights if she were still at the school. In fact, Coach Bryans has pointed to the lightweights as examples of the excellence for which her heavyweight teams strive. Nonetheless, it is a bit galling to see a heavyweight coach represent a championship lightweight crew when heavyweight coaches' support for lightweights is so questionable.

Bryans (who does note Mary Shofner's departure) points out that the squad lost six seniors last year.

2 comments:

Anonymous
said...

I think it is good for the University and media to recognize the lightweights IRA championship in the same light as the NCAA Championships earned by the other sports. I think that is a large step forward.